What's New In Food: July 2014

The Science Behind Bacon + Everything Else You Need To Know About Food This Month

I'm not quite sure how it happened, but we appear to be halfway through the year, and I am already filling up my calendar well into 2015. All that being said, there are still plenty of great food events to attend, restaurant openings to get excited about and culinary classics to read before we all start singing “Auld Lang Syne” one more time. So, without further delay, here are some of the most interesting snippets I have collected for the month

Food News

Another Day, Another List of The Best Restaurants Barely a handful of days can pass without an email announcing yet another new list of “Best Restaurants.” I tend to ignore most of them out of hand. However, this latest best restaurant list from OAD (Opinionated About Dining) deserves more than a fleeting glance because it is compiled from the responses of a group of the world’s most experienced fine diners. These are people who actually pay for their meals with hard-earned cash from their own pockets and whose views, in my opinion, carry more weight than just about any other panel in the business.

America, Where Good Cheese Goes to Die? Just when you think that the American craft cheese business is turning the corner, the FDA have to stick their bureaucratic beak in and muck things up. There are some truly world-class cheeses being made in the U.S. right now, but seemingly mindless decisions like this one, preventing cheese from being aged on wooden boards, threaten this nascent craft industry with a return to the culinary dark ages.

For the Love of the Love AppleThere are few tastes more wonderful than a freshly picked tomato. The World Tomato Society is the first organization that I am aware of to offer cooks and gardeners access to classes, plant sales and information on nearly 5,000 varieties of tomato. So, if you, like me, are a tomato fanatic, $39 seems like a pretty fair price for membership.

Why Bacon Smells AmazingJust about every vegetarian I know who has returned to the righteous fold of meat eaters has been lured back by one thing: the smell of bacon. There are few people who can resist the lure of cured pork frying in the morning, and now scientists have discovered why. Researchers found that when bacon is cooked in a hot pan, over 150 chemical compounds are released which, in combination, produce the smell that can turn even a confirmed vegan into wild-eyed carnivore.

New Food Gadgets

The Right KnifeAs any really good chef will tell you that you don’t need to own lots of knives to cook well, but you do need to own the right knives. When I come across a brand that I really like to use in my own kitchen, I think it’s only fair to share the news with others. These perfectly balanced knives with polished rosewood handles from Rhineland Cutlery are as beautiful to look at as they are to use, and the 7-inch Asian Cleaver has already become my go-to blade for nearly all occasions.

Zoku Ice Cream BowlThis fantastic little gadget has become one of my recent favorites, and, with summer upon us, I am sure it’s going to get even more use in the next few weeks. The bowl is kept ready and waiting in your freezer compartment and, when filled with your favorite ingredients for ice cream, sorbet or frozen yogurt, turns them into a near flawless dessert in around 10 minutes.Zoku at Amazon.com